9,000 cartons of duty-unpaid cigarettes seized at Woodland Checkpoint

A Malaysia-registered truck, driven by a lone 33-year-old Malaysian man, was directed for further checks after arriving at the Woodlands Checkpoint by an officer from the Immigration & Checkpoints Authority (ICA) on 2 June 2017 at about 9.30pm.

The ICA officer had noticed anomalies in the scanned images of the truck which was conveying a consignment declared to be assorted bread. During the course of checks, ICA officers found 9,000 cartons of duty-unpaid cigarettes concealed among the consignment.

The total duty and Goods and Services Tax evaded amounted to about S$740,300 and S$54,630 respectively. The driver, duty-unpaid cigarettes, and truck were handed over to Singapore Customs for investigations.

The vehicle used in the commission of such offences is liable to be forfeited, ICA stated.

The truck used in the smuggling of 9,000 cartons duty-unpaid cigarettes / photo: ICA

“Our borders are our first line of defence in safeguarding Singapore’s security. The security checks are critical to our nation’s security. The ICA will continue to conduct security checks on passengers and vehicles at the checkpoints to prevent attempts to smuggle in undesirable persons, drugs, weapons, explosives and other contrabands.” ICA stressed.

“The same methods of concealment used by contraband smugglers may be used by terrorists to smuggle arms and explosives to carry out attacks in Singapore,” ICA reminded.

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